Let's play catch-up...

Since the blog was last updated....

Playin' in the backyard!

Sable's been a busy busy puppy! After going out to the cabin things got rainy in Edmonton... and if the mosquitoes weren't bad before... holy ****... they're bad now! We recently headed to a nearby park to throw a ball for Sable and a man stopped us just before we arrived. He began to shout about how we couldn't go on the grass and that we were going to kill our dog if we entered the park... Jeff and I assumed this was an overreaction and that the man was possibly a little off his rocker.

Trying to get Sable to do some agility... it didn't work.

BOY WERE WE WRONG! We set one foot on the grass and Sable was immediately covered in mosquitoes. I think every square inch of her had at least two mosquitoes... even living in Alaska I had never seen so many. Needless to say we turned and ran... literally we had to run to get away from all the mosquitoes we had collected.

As far as the rain is concerned... originally Sable was unsure of the concept of water falling on top of her, but she got used to it. The grass that rapidly grew into a forest in the back yard, after the rain, was not among the things she'll get used to. In fact, she's starting to refuse to even go out to the back yard (makes 'letting her out to pee' a little more difficult). At a few points in the last month the grass has been up past her belly, so I can understand how that might make going to the bathroom a little difficult. Now that the grass is freshly cut she seems to distrust the grass, but she's dealing with it.

Pets in the Park... Dogs, Parrots, Ferrets,
and Cats made appearances.

I've been really interested in finding new fun events and festivals to attend around Edmonton as of late. I had been looking specifically for things that Sable could participate in. Lo and behold they have a day dedicated to pets! Pets in the Park was an awesome weekend activity. It's basically exactly what the title implies... pets-in-the-park. There were sheep dog herding demonstrations, doggy carnival games, and freebies (like toys and treats) from the booths set up around the park. I think it is safe to say Sable was in dog heaven! She dominated the carnival games as they generally revolved around food: bobbing for hot dogs, biscuit eating contest, and musical mats. She won a bag of dog treats and a GIANT rope toy... which she is still trying to destroy as we speak.

Sable was SO excited!

The very next weekend we hit up the dog park with Sable's buddy Dixon, before heading downtown to The Works Art and Design Festival. At 'The Works' Sable met all sorts of little kids... she learned that they have tasty hands and are about the same size as her. I was pleasantly surprised, though, to see that she wasn't effected by the kids jumping up behind her or grabbing her ears or tail. We even got compliments on how 'well behaved' Sable was, although I may have burst out laughing inside at the mere idea that Sable could be 'well behaved'. The only reason she seemed to behave was because she was exhausted from the dog park and river swimming she had done right before going downtown.

Sable watching the agility dogs
show off.

After 'The Works'  we walked down to the Canada Day Celebration at the Legislature Building and a few hours later attended the fireworks display. Sable was NOT impressed with the fireworks. She immediately turned to run and when she finally realized she wasn't getting anywhere she sat down for the long haul and refused to look in the direction of the fireworks. At certain points she was even burying her head into Jeff's side as if it helped her escape, but by the end of the show she had settled in and accepted the fact that she wasn't leaving until we did.

The scary fireworks...

And after all of the busy activity of the previous weeks and the long stretch of good health, it finally caught up with Sable... she came down with kennel cough. Apparently the kennel cough vaccine only protects against a few of the 300+ strains of the virus... so of course Sable managed to come in contact with one of the strains she wasn't protected against and got sick. Luckily most of her symptoms were confined to a three day period and a week after the first symptoms, all the basic symptoms were gone. Sable still has to wait for one more full week before she can socialize with other dogs as the virus can still be contagious and in the meantime she's certainly getting antsy. Now that she's almost 100% again we'll be looking for more fun outdoor activities to partake in for the coming weeks!

Sick puppy

...I'll be keeping you posted! (as long as things don't get too busy ;-P)